James Copeland expected to spend his first Father’s Day with his wife, Emily, wrapped up in painting a baby room and preparing for the Aug. 1 arrival of their firstborn son, Matthew.
But Father’s Day came unexpectedly early for Copeland — it came May 11.
And he spent the wondrous and memorable moment in the parking lot of Maytown Baptist Church, Mulga, sitting in his ’97 Plymouth Breeze with his premature newborn wrapped in his shirt.
“Emily wasn’t due until the first of August, so when she had some back pain, we didn’t realize it was labor,” said Copeland, youth minister of Bethel Baptist Church, Dora, in Sulphur Springs Baptist Association. “We got in the car to go to the doctor, and we weren’t a mile away from the house when he had been born.”
The couple and their 3-pound newborn — just seconds old — pulled into the parking lot of Maytown Baptist, known for being a central hub for area paramedics. They wrapped little Matthew in his father’s shirt, stayed on the phone with a 911 operator and waited.
“We knew they (the paramedics) could find us here because this is where they bring the lifesaver helicopter. It was rush hour on a Thursday morning, so we knew they’d get here faster than we could get to a hospital,” James Copeland said.
The first to arrive on the scene was Ann Goolsby, a Maytown Baptist member who is mayor of Maytown and a nurse’s assistant at Children’s Hospital in Birmingham. Goolsby, who was passing the church on her way to retrieve a school binder her daughter had forgotten, stopped and helped the stunned couple prepare Matthew for his ambulance ride into Birmingham.
“We had already chosen the name Matthew, but on the ambulance ride, we realized it was more appropriate than ever — Matthew means ‘gift from God,’” Emily Copeland said.
The Copelands’ gift from God — though he arrived earlier than they’d planned — is a month old, and he’s “developmentally perfect but just so tiny,” according to his father.
“He just wanted to get here in time for Mother’s Day,” James Copeland said.
“And Father’s Day,” his wife added.
The Copelands are going back and forth from their home in Adamsville to visit their son in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit of UAB Hospital in Birmingham two or three times a day and will continue to do so until Matthew’s due date or when he weighs in at 5 pounds, whichever comes first.
“We just tried to give him his first bottle, and he doesn’t quite know what to do with it, so they are waiting until he develops just a few more things before we take him home,” Emily Copeland said.
In the meantime, Bethel Baptist — a church the couple has only served since Easter — is being more than supportive, James Copeland said.
“The chairman of the deacons said, ‘You take care of your family. Don’t worry about us.’ They have been really awesome. And the chairperson of the search committee that brought us here works at UAB and fills in in Matthew’s unit sometimes, so she keeps an eye on him,” he explained. “Just Sunday night at church, someone came up and shook my hand and left a $20 bill in it. We’ve just been so blessed.”
Church secretary Jan Golden said it’s the least they can do for the young minister who came to a pastorless church and began doing double duty.
“We’ve been without a youth pastor since the fall and without a pastor since the end of the year, so we really joined around James and Emily,” she said. “He’s a proud papa and they are a wonderful family.”
Walker’s Chapel Baptist Church, Fultondale, in Birmingham Baptist Association — the Copelands former church — held a shower for the couple June 10.
And Bethel planned a churchwide baby tea in Matthew’s honor but decided to hold off on scheduling it until the infant comes home and could come to the party, too.
“The baby is doing fabulously, and we just can’t wait to have him here,” Golden said.
Share with others: